


Patchwork

by stuckoncloud9



Series: New 52 Scarebat [2]
Category: Batman (Comics)
Genre: Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Missing Scene, New 52, Obsession, because they don't know what's really happening, but the other character's consent is not actually dubious, i don't know but at this point you've been sufficiently warned, is it still dub-con if one character THINKS it's dub-con, or does it circle back around to dub-con for the first character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-20
Updated: 2020-11-20
Packaged: 2021-03-10 07:07:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,774
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27639308
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stuckoncloud9/pseuds/stuckoncloud9
Summary: In Scarecrow's brainwashed "Gothtopia," almost all of the city's vigilantes have fallen under the control of the villain's new toxin. Almost.(A missing scene from Detective Comics #29)
Relationships: Jonathan Crane/Bruce Wayne
Series: New 52 Scarebat [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2020975
Comments: 4
Kudos: 26





	Patchwork

**Author's Note:**

> The Gothtopia arc is full of weird plot holes (how has no one outside Gotham noticed that the city is being openly run by supervillains?), mischaracterizations (why is mind controlling the city a SCARECROW plot? He does fear, not mind control? Batman already has TWO villains who do mind control?!?), and just terrible things that should never have been published in any comic book ever (Catwoman's greatest fantasy is to be ROBIN? Gross. Weird and gross). 
> 
> BUT it also establishes three things about New 52 Scarecrow I found interesting:  
> 1\. He doesn't want to know Batman's secret identity/see under Batman's mask.  
> 2\. He made a patchwork batsuit inspired by the aesthetic of his own costume that, when Bruce tried it on, fit PERFECTLY.  
> 3\. When Bruce turns on Scarecrow and knocks him out, revealing that he hadn't been under Scarecrow's control after all, Jonathan hallucinates getting revenge on Batman by ripping his heart out. 
> 
> With all of that low-hanging fruit, I couldn't resist writing out the missing scene between Scarecrow telling Batman he has a "more appropriate outfit" for him to wear, and the scene where Scarecrow is showing off Patchwork Batman to his supervillain friends.

“Batman, STOP!”

Bruce couldn’t stop, actually. The momentum of his dive backwards meant that he either had to finish the roll or fall head first onto the concrete of Arkham’s loading bay. The latter option would have been undesirable in just about any scenario, but especially in this moment, given that he was trying to _avoid_ a blow to the head from Barbara Gordon.

He was back on his feet in an instant, sacrificing stability for speed. Against a faster opponent like Barbara, taking a moment to gain better footing wasn’t just a waste of time, it was an invitation for a strike. Bruce braced for impact, readying himself to catch the inevitable assault against his still-unsteady legs.

But it never came. Barbara had stopped — not frozen, but relaxed, swaying slightly from side to side. She stared at Bruce through the clumsy eyeholes of her burlap mask, bemused. Bruce watched as her eyes moved from his own to a point directly behind him.

Bruce turned. 

“I’ve already taken your friends’ sanity,” Scarecrow said. One of his bony hands was casually placed on Catwoman’s shoulder, positioning her in front of him. The other held the grip of his scythe, placing its blade against Selina’s throat. “Then their capacity for independent thought.”

Between her opaque goggles and her own burlap head covering, it was difficult to make out Catwoman’s expression. But her posture was as nonchalant as Barbara’s; serene, amused, and entirely unconcerned with the deadly weapon at her neck.

“Cooperate,” Crane said, pulling his scythe so close it cut through the rope wrapped around the bottom of Selina’s scarecrow mask. “Or I’ll start taking their _lives_ , as well.”

Bruce heard the cracking of vines behind him and stepped to the side. In an instant Kate Kane was whipped through the air where he’d been standing. She crashed to the ground with considerably more force than Bruce thought was necessary, given that she’d probably gone just as passive as Selina and Barbara. 

“Batman, don’t you _dare_ ,” Poison Ivy demanded, raising up the tendrils of her plants with a commanding arm. She gestured towards Scarecrow, sending the vines rocketing in his direction. Barbara was on them in an instant, slicing through the organic material with the sharp edge of a batarang. Kate leapt back to her feet, twisting midair into a flying kick that collided with Ivy before she could take another step in Scarecrow’s direction. 

As Batgirl and Batwoman attacked Poison Ivy in tandem, Bruce found himself wondering who it was they thought they were protecting. Their placidity of moments before was gone, replaced by a desperate viciousness to keep Ivy away from the stick-thin supervillain.

“What’s it going to be, Batman?” Scarecrow asked.

Ivy gave a short scream of frustration. “If you think I went through all the trouble of waking you up just so you can help this spindly little freak capture me again—”

“I’m sorry, Ivy,” Bruce said, stepping forward with his hands raised in surrender. “What do you mean, ‘cooperate?’”

Scarecrow’s grin was visible even through the stitched mouth of his mask. “Nothing too difficult,” he said, gesturing for Bruce to come closer. “All you have to do is.... breathe.”

He raised his hand off of Selina’s shoulder, revealing the gauntlet of thin toxin canisters strapped under his wrist. He flexed his fingers, causing the mechanism to release a cloud of sickly orange vapor into Bruce’s face. 

It wasn’t fear gas. Bruce was very familiar with the symptoms of fear gas: a burning sensation, followed by rapid synaptic and neural misfires, followed by intense hallucinations of situations causing stress or trauma. 

This sensation was new, a slow numbing and clouding of the senses. Bruce fell to the ground without even feeling the impact against the concrete. He didn’t remember the first time he had fallen under the effect of Crane’s new formula — it could have been days ago, or weeks, or over a month. He’d only been awake since last night, but he could already feel his hard-earned alertness slipping away, replaced by a deadening cold that moved inwards from his limbs to his very core.

Then, just as suddenly, he woke up. His cheek burned where Poison Ivy had kissed him with the antidote, a warmth that settled into his skin and sank deep. It seared away the numbness, returning his mind to clarity. 

He managed to contain his sigh of relief. He’d had faith in Ivy’s ability to develop an effective counteragent to the new toxin, even under pressure. But trusting a supervillain to help him fight another supervillain was always a gamble, especially when their modus operandi were as seemingly compatible as Ivy’s pheromones and Scarecrow’s new mind-numbing toxin.

Fortunately, in this case they seemed to have been a little _too_ compatible; Ivy’s natural immunity to his formulas meant Scarecrow couldn’t control her, and Ivy’s domineering personality meant she couldn’t abide allowing anyone else control over the masses.

“Stand up, Batman.”

Bruce opened his eyes, realizing they had still been closed. He was lying flat on his back on the cold ground, feeling returning to his limbs.

Scarecrow was standing above him. He was no longer holding Catwoman; the sharp singing of claws in the air suggested she had joined the fight against Ivy. Instead, Scarecrow’s hand was extended to his fallen foe. Bruce took it, allowing the man to help pull him to his feet. 

His long fingers remained wrapped around Bruce’s even after Batman was standing evenly at his side. “You belong to _me_ now,” Scarecrow said, his eyes trained on Bruce’s as he finally let the gloved hand go.

That seemed more than a little possessive, but Bruce supposed the important thing was that Scarecrow believed it. The trouble would be making sure he continued to do so. Thankfully, Bruce could see an opportunity to reinforce this belief coming towards him over Scarecrow’s shoulder.

Scarecrow sputtered as Bruce grabbed him by the waist; he’d evidently discarded his scythe during Bruce’s lapse of consciousness, and pounded his fists against his captor’s chest as Bruce lifted him off his feet. Crane’s advantage in combat was his speed and flexibility, neither of which were of much use in brute forcing his way out of the arms of a stronger opponent.

His struggling stopped, however, when an airborne Catwoman was whipped through the air where Scarecrow had been standing. Selina crashed to the ground several feet away, trying and failing to return to her feet. Bruce lowered the thinner man back to the ground. Crane quickly disentangled himself from Bruce’s arms, backing away in the direction of where he’d left his scythe. Bruce looked over his shoulder, then moved to place himself between Scarecrow and the approaching Ivy.

“ _Fight_ it, Batman,” she said, glaring pointedly at Bruce’s cheek. Kate and Barbara grabbed her arms from behind, causing Ivy to hiss in frustration. Roots erupted through the concrete beneath their feet, wrapping around their legs and preventing them from pulling her backwards. 

“Absolutely not,” Scarecrow spat from behind them. “You fight for _me_ now, Batman. Dispense with her.” 

_I have a plan_ , Bruce tried to communicate with his expression as he stepped toward Ivy. _I promise I will make this up to you._

 _I am going to rip your spleen out through your nose_ , Ivy’s expression replied.

Bruce punched her in the face. Ivy dropped like a rock in Kate and Barbara’s arms, her roots releasing the brainwashed vigilantes without their mistress awake to animate them. 

“Excellent,” Scarecrow said, seeming pleased with the display. Now that Ivy was down, he walked out from behind Bruce to approach the other heroes. His scythe was raised to strike as he cautiously leaned over the redhead hanging between Batgirl and Batwoman. Evidently she was unconscious enough to satisfy him, as when he stepped away it was with a much more relaxed posture. 

“Batwoman, take her back to her cell,” Scarecrow said, gesturing for Barbara to step away. Kate effortlessly hefted Poison Ivy over her muscular shoulders, turning around to pass back through the doors of Arkham Asylum. “Selina, Batgirl, collect my assistants. We have business to attend to downtown.”

The pair walked off in the opposite direction, towards the road. Apparently Mr. Freeze, Harley Quinn and Professor Pyg had already left their center of operations for the evening. It disturbed Bruce to imagine what the three were doing in the brainwashed city, free to indulge whatever criminal impulses they desired while Gotham’s citizens were too numbed by toxin to resist. 

“Batman...” Scarecrow said, refocusing Bruce’s attention. They were alone in the Arkham courtyard, his brainwashed allies all dispersed to their various tasks. “I’ve prepared a more appropriate outfit for you.”

That sounded deeply unpleasant, though Bruce imagined that Scarecrow probably wanted him to respond in the positive. Or should he say anything at all? Barbara, Kate, and Selina hadn’t been that responsive to Crane’s orders, though Bruce knew from personal experience that victims of Scarecrow’s new toxin were more than capable of carrying on a conversation.

He compromised by tilting his head, staring at Scarecrow expectantly. Crane let his scythe rest over his shoulder, stepping in the direction of the asylum and gesturing for Bruce to follow him.

Bruce obliged. He couldn’t help but feel dread in the pit of his stomach as they re-entered Arkham. Gotham TV and radio personalities always loved debating the extent to which the inmates were running the asylum, but today the answer wasn’t in question. The transparent walls of Arkham’s padded cells made no effort to hide that the sanitarium’s usual guards and medical staff were imprisoned inside, while the criminally insane laughed and danced through the fluorescent-lit halls.

It was unclear whether their reverie was the delusional effect of Crane’s new toxin, or if they were unexposed and celebrating the fall of Gotham with full cognizance of their surroundings. They parted for Crane regardless, echoing pleased greetings as he and Bruce passed through the crowds. 

“I had wondered if the dosage in Gotham’s water supply would be enough for you,” Scarecrow said absentmindedly as he stopped in front of a closed office door. “It seemed possible that your years of exposure to my fear toxin would have lended you a resistance to my new formula. I was tempted to run tests in person, but I worried getting too close might allow you to put together what happened, if you hadn’t already.” 

The door was labeled with the name _Jeremiah Arkham,_ though Bruce doubted the asylum’s director had been permitted to keep his office under the new villainous management. Scarecrow reached into his tattered brown long coat, pulling out a key.

“It’s comforting to know that you were only able to subvert my new toxin under Pamela’s influence,” Crane remarked, unlocking the door. “Though predictable, in retrospect. Given your choice in career, I’m sure you’ve had much more practice resisting fear than resisting contentment.”

He gestured for Bruce to walk through first. Bruce entered, glancing around his surroundings. The room didn’t seem too altered from the last time he’d seen it, other than a few maps of Gotham pinned up against the far wall. Either Scarecrow had been too busy to redecorate, or he and Jeremiah had similar tastes in interior design. 

“That’s not a judgement, of course,” Scarecrow said, walking over to the desk. He crouched to open one of the lower drawers, carefully drawing out a pile of fabric. “In fact, I can relate.” 

He straightened, letting the fabric unfold as he rose. Bruce stifled his surprise as he stared at the costume Scarecrow was holding in front of him. The rest of Crane’s mind-numbed vigilantes had clearly been wearing their normal costumes, with the addition of a scarecrow mask. Some amount of modification had been obvious; Bruce guessed that Jonathan didn’t just have spare masks lying around with bat or cat ears (though if he did, it would have raised another question entirely). 

But this wasn’t a burlap sack with sewn-on ears. This was a full Batman costume — though it seemed to be more inspired by one of his earlier suits than anything he’d worn recently. Crane laid it out on the desk, reaching back into the drawer to pull out a pair of black boots and gloves. Lastly, he pulled out a long, tattered cape, more of a dark inky blue in shade than a pure black. 

“Put it on,” Scarecrow ordered, gesturing towards the ensemble. He leaned back down to open another drawer. “I can adjust it once I see how it fits.”

Bruce walked over to the desk. Scarecrow was still rifling through the contents of the second drawer, but he didn’t look like he had any intention of leaving the room.

Generally, Bruce didn’t care if people saw him in a state of undress. His body was a tool; his only emotional investment in it was how well it did what he needed it to do, and nothing beyond that. But the costume Scarecrow had set in front of him had a cowl, which meant that Bruce would have to remove _his_ cowl to wear it. 

Crane finally found what he was looking for; a small, nondescript aluminum tin. He looked up, frowning behind the loosely stitched mouth of his mask. “Well?”

Bruce willed himself to relax. He reached up to his cowl, his gloved fingers carefully configuring the pattern for the release. When he heard the _click_ of Lucius’s design unlocking, he carefully drew the helm away from his head...

...and Scarecrow glanced away, turning his attention to the tin in his hands. 

Bruce managed to restrain his sigh of relief. He’d been prepared to give up the long game and attack Scarecrow now if he had to, but he’d seen Crane’s disinterest as a possibility. It was doubtless that Scarecrow had possessed numerous chances to uncover Batman’s secret identity while he’d been drugged into oblivion with the rest of the city, and yet he’d clearly taken none of them; nor had he unmasked Barbara or Kate, who had still been wearing their usual cowls under Crane’s trademark burlap. 

Now that he had relative privacy, Bruce fully removed his cowl, setting it gingerly on Jeremiah’s desk. Crane had moved to sit down on the wooden surface, thumbing open the box in his hands to pull out various sewing supplies. As Bruce set about pulling off the rest of his suit, his technical captor started threading a needle, wetting the end of the thin cord in the corner of his mouth before drawing it through the metal eye. 

When his own costume was off, Bruce lifted up the suit that Crane had provided. It was two pieces — a silvery grey tunic and separate leggings in the same shade. The material definitely wasn’t burlap, for which Bruce was eternally grateful. It wasn’t kevlar either, which meant that Alfred would probably have to get out his suture kit before all was said and done, but the fabric at least seemed flexible and functional. Given the situation, it was more than Bruce could have asked for. 

As he examined the tunic, he noticed the heavy black stitches crisscrossing the grey fabric. They weren’t the seams; Bruce could feel those at the sides, two thin, straight lines sewn neatly in thread the same color as the surrounding fabric. As Bruce looked closer, he realized the black stitches weren’t holding the tunic together at all. They were embroidered on top, giving the carefully constructed shirt the illusion of being a slapdashed patchwork. The pants were sewn with the same effect, though they lacked the most notable example of embroidery on the tunic: a pitch black bat, its edges sharp and uneven against the silver backing. From afar it probably appeared as a nightmarish distortion of Batman’s symbol, but this close all Bruce could notice was the skill and care of the design’s deceptively elegant stitching. 

Bruce looked up to see Scarecrow staring in his direction. His pulse raced momentarily before he realized that Crane was clearly not looking at his face, focusing instead on where Bruce’s bare hands touched the thread of the embroidery. His eyes still refused to look anywhere above Bruce’s neck, and as such seemed unaware that his gaze was being returned. 

Curious, Bruce kept his gaze on Scarecrow’s eyes as pulled on the base of the costume. The details of Crane’s expression were lost beneath the shadows of his mask, but his stare followed Bruce’s hands as he pulled the skin tight material over his body. 

To Bruce’s relieved surprise, the fabric against his skin didn’t have any of the itchy, awkward backstitching that he’d been expecting. The material on the inside of the garment was smooth, and much more breathable than the weather-resistant fabric on the surface. Bruce guessed that it was the same lining that Scarecrow used for the inside of his own costumes — he’d never examined one personally, but he’d always found it unlikely that Crane would engage in strenuous physical activity in nothing but burlap. There was a line between masochism and just being defeatist. 

He grabbed the cape and cowl. It was one piece, unlike his own suit. They had the same illusory patchwork design, though the black thread wasn’t as noticeable against the dark blue as it was against the grey. He pulled the purposefully distressed garment over his head, noting that Scarecrow glanced away again as he did so. 

Jeremiah Arkham didn’t have a lot of mirrors in his office, presumably due to what he’d have to see if he looked at them. But he did have a lot of awards and certificates framed on his wall, and Bruce was able to get the gist of his appearance from his reflection in the glass.

The effect was something out of a horror movie, though perhaps not a particularly well-budgeted one. The inspiration for the look was subtler than Bruce had been expecting; unlike the burlap sacks that Kate and Babs were wearing over their heads, Crane’s influence on the costume’s design wouldn’t be obvious from a distance. Even up close, the patchwork stitching seemed more like a twisted reflection of Batman’s usual costume than a reference to the Scarecrow. Bruce wondered if the effect was reminiscent of how he appeared to Crane when the man was under the influence of his own fear toxin. 

Bruce heard a low hum of approval from the direction of the desk, drawing his attention back to Scarecrow. Crane rose from his makeshift seat to get closer, tucking the sewing tin under his arm as he approached.

“It fits,” he said, sounding pleased. “I thought you might have changed sizes since the last time I took your measurements.” 

That was an unsettling thought, though Bruce supposed that Scarecrow had certainly had him tied to tables and hung from ceilings enough times over the years to have gotten the time to pull out a measuring tape at some point. Bruce had presumably been too drugged out of his mind to notice. Technically speaking, he was supposed to be too drugged out of his mind to have even heard Crane mention it. 

Scarecrow knelt, sticking the threaded needle between his teeth as he leaned down to examine the material at Bruce’s calves. They were slightly looser than the fabric at his thighs; evidently whenever Crane had taken his measurements, his boots had interfered with their accuracy. 

Bruce prepared himself to stifle any reaction, but the stabs of pain he was expecting from the needle never came. Either Crane was quite the expert seamster, or he was carefully avoiding piercing Bruce’s skin along with the seam he was adjusting. Bruce would have expected him to go out of his way to stab his enemy as much as possible, but apparently Crane possessed more restraint than Bruce had credited him with. It was possible that the new toxin prevented sensations of pain, and so Scarecrow wasn’t bothering to cause it. Or maybe he just didn’t see the point of damaging his new toy.

Scarecrow moved up to Bruce’s wrists, which were the other point of ill-fitting contention. Presumably the gloves had thrown off Crane’s measurements there, too. Honestly, if Bruce wasn’t so disturbed by the dedication, he’d be impressed that Scarecrow had managed to measure with any accuracy at all. The suit as a whole was designed to make him look bigger than he was, as well as hide the details of his human proportions. 

Crane’s re-designed batsuit was also obviously attempting to cut an intimidating figure, but being fabric instead of armor, it was considerably less effective at hiding Bruce’s real dimensions. The most notable glimpse into Bruce’s humanity was his eyes — his typical cowl was more of a helmet than any literal hood, and its white-out lenses disguised his features completely, in addition to their other technological benefits. 

But this cowl was just that. A mask. He could see his eyes in his reflection; blue, cold, and presumably far less affected than they would be, were he actually under the influence of a hallucinatory drug. Scarecrow’s normal toxin caused the pupils to contract into pinpoints, but if his new formula overwhelmed its victim with “contentment,” the resulting release of endorphins would doubtlessly cause them to dilate. A commonality between the two drugs might be causing nystagmus, a rapid involuntary eye movement that Bruce did not trust himself to replicate convincingly in front of an expert like Crane. 

Scarecrow’s thin fingers brushed the skin of Bruce’s hand, and the chill of his touch alerted Bruce to another problem entirely. He remembered the cold, numbing sensation of Crane’s new formula, deadening his senses to the world until it was burned away by Ivy’s cure. There was little doubt that the new toxin slowed blood flow in its victims, keeping their bodies too relaxed to fight off its hallucinatory effects.

Bruce was _not_ relaxed. He doubted his natural heart rate ever got as slow as Crane’s new formula would dictate, even with all the dietary and exercise methods Bruce employed to lower his blood pressure. Bruce ran hot; it was a natural side effect of his high metabolism, how many calories his daily activities burned. If the warmth of his skin made Scarecrow think to check Bruce’s pulse, it might not be difficult for him to realize that his enemy was faking. 

Scarecrow finished with his right arm, moving on to the left. He was still kneeling, though his back had straightened so as to better reach Bruce’s forearms. Crane was definitely too tall to have performed the adjustments to Bruce’s calves from anywhere but the ground, but presumably he could have stood up and made Bruce hold out his arms for easier access. 

He was concentrating very hard on the task at hand, that Bruce could tell even through the mask. His focus might have been why he didn’t realize the significance of the temperature difference. Bruce would think that Scarecrow hadn’t noticed the touch at all, if he hadn’t had such a clear view of how Crane had flinched away from the contact, almost dropping the needle.

Crane’s long fingers were dangerously close to the inside of Bruce’s wrist. If touch was a distraction, Bruce wouldn’t hesitate to employ it. 

He moved his right hand to the side of Scarecrow’s mask, where the man’s cheek would be. Crane froze. His deft hands were still drawing a closer seam for Bruce’s sleeve, but the rest of his body was completely motionless as Bruce idly stroked the rough material covering the villain’s face. 

Bruce wondered if Crane was going to order him to stop; he appeared to be considering it, as uncomfortable as he clearly was. But Scarecrow stayed silent, working with the same focused precision as he had before Bruce’s diversion.

His task finished, eventually. Crane lowered his hands from their place at Bruce’s arm, letting the needle drop into the tin sitting between his knees. He rose, standing up so slowly that the motion didn’t force Bruce’s hand away from his mask. 

Bruce considered letting his hand drop away regardless. It’s purpose had been served, and Crane was no longer touching his wrists. Now that the adjustments were done, Bruce could put on the gloves Scarecrow had provided and block any further access to his pulse.

At least, he could when Scarecrow _moved._ Currently the man was standing directly in front of Bruce, blocking any attempt at movement that didn’t directly involve pushing Crane away. 

Bruce had known, logically, that Crane had two inches on him at the criminal’s recorded height of 6’4’’. The added height of the batsuit, however, combined with Scarecrow’s notoriously terrible posture, had always made their difference in stature seem reversed. Standing barefoot next to Crane, who was wearing combat-ready boots of his own, quickly dispersed with that illusion.

Scarecrow’s eyes were locked on his, now, and Bruce wondered if his deception was over. The muscles in his right arm tensed. If Crane signaled any seeming revelations, the hand resting over his cheek could slam his head into the wall in an instant. At the moment, however, the emotion in Crane’s brown eyes was unreadable.

“Who are you s-s-seeing?” he asked, head tilting questioningly. The flicker of a frown was visible beneath the mouth of his mask. Bruce assumed the displeasure was less directed at him and more towards Crane’s momentary lapse in bypassing the blocks in his speech.

Crane’s file at Arkham theorized that his stutter was a symptom of childhood trauma, ingrained deep in his psyche by his father’s abusive research. Bruce doubted it. Not because he thought Crane was faking, though the file had suggested it as an alternative explanation. Every Arkham file inevitably offered “faking it” as a possibility for any and all patient behaviors. When Bruce was ransacking their digital archives for useful information, he tended to read around it. Jeremiah and his colleagues had a tendency to interpret “high functioning” as “mentally sound,” especially when their supposedly lunatic patients humiliated them by escaping on a regular basis.The courts of Gotham rarely agreed. Bruce didn’t either, though his opinion had more to do with personal experience. 

In Scarecrow’s case, Bruce had every reason to believe the stutter was real. But research into the subject had convinced him that the condition was likely more a result of genetics than anything purely psychological. Crane’s current psychiatrist attributed his inability to prevent his stuttering when under the effect of his own fear toxin to mental regression into his childhood. Bruce thought a more likely explanation was that the chemically induced state of agitation kept Crane from speaking in a relaxed mode; that was the standard treatment protocol for stutterers, which Crane had doubtlessly been taught by the speech therapist he’d seen as a ward of the state. Sliding through verbal blocks required precise control over the muscles that contracted during speech.

“Who do you see?” Crane repeated, more carefully this time. “Pamela? S-S—” He swallowed. “Catwoman?”

His eyes remained unreadable. Bruce couldn’t tell what reply would most detract suspicion. Scarecrow seemed to have an answer in mind, but there was a foreboding tension in the air that made Bruce hesitant to find it. The body standing inches from Bruce’s own was tense, as if bracing for a punch.

“Jonathan,” Bruce decided.

Scarecrow shuddered, a full body motion that Bruce could feel through the rough material of his mask. He reached upwards, and for a moment Bruce shifted his weight in preparation to strike, sure he’d given the wrong answer. But instead Crane’s hand came to rest over Bruce’s fingers on his face. He pulled them away, carefully, as if Bruce might be as easily startled as one of Crane’s trained crows. 

He let go as soon as Bruce’s hand left the stitched burlap. He hesitated for a moment. Then, to Bruce’s surprise, he pulled off his mask. He held it, balled up in one hand, as he spoke. “What do I look like?”

Bruce doubted there had ever been a tactful answer to that question. If there was, it wasn’t now, when Crane’s overgrown brown hair was tangled and flattened from his head covering. The state of his skin made it obvious that he hadn't taken the mask off in days, a condition that Bruce's teenage associates affectionately called “cowl acne.” Even without the active state of dishevelment, Scarecrow looked the same as he ever did; beady eyes, gaunt features, awkward angles.

“You don't know?” Bruce asked, trying to sound confused. It wasn’t entirely an act; he wasn’t sure what Crane wanted from him. A laundry list of physical features? Bruce had just given one in his head, and it hadn’t been exceptionally flattering. Nor did it sound like something a blissed-out toxin victim would say of his captor.

Crane frowned. Something left his expression, a subtle emotion Bruce only noticed in its absence. “I’m well aware.”

That didn’t bode well. Bruce caught Scarecrow’s face before he could draw back. His fingers curled under the man’s chin, tilting his head until he was looking back down at Bruce. His thumb brushed over Crane’s most distinctive feature; the scars marring his lips.

The first time Batman and Scarecrow had met, the latter had sewn his mouth shut weeks prior. The stitches hadn’t been tight enough to prevent Crane from talking, though whether the thread had been left intentionally loose from the get-go or merely stretched out over time was anyone’s guess. Even Scarecrow himself might not know, given the state he must have been in when he did it. When Batman finally brought Crane in, the doctors had been astonished that none of the wounds had gone septic. When they were brought reports of his living conditions at the time, they called it a miracle.

The bleeding mess that had been Jonathan Crane’s face was a large part of the jury’s decision to send him to Arkham. The prosecution’s point that Scarecrow had disfigured himself on purpose to frighten his kidnapped test subjects didn’t do much to persuade them otherwise. There were easier ways to scare children, the defense had argued. Who of sound mind would choose self-mutilation?

Arkham hadn’t cured Crane of his criminal tendencies, but to Bruce’s knowledge, the man hadn’t attempted anything similar since his original internment there. Maybe it was just distaste for the consequences. The bandages and dressing that Arkham’s doctors had applied to the wounds _had_ rendered him incapable of speaking. The great and fearsome Scarecrow had spent over a month communicating through grunts and gestures, eating all his meals through a straw. 

Whatever the reason, Bruce had found himself relieved with the results. Any denizen of Arkham could tell you how punishing Batman was to his opponents. But watching them hurt themselves was a peculiar kind of torture that Bruce could never quite move past. 

Scarecrow’s lips parted, and this close Bruce could feel his shiver as fingers caressed the scars of self-inflicted wounds. Spider-like fingers wrapped around Bruce’s wrist, and this time there was no difference in temperature; Crane’s hands had warmed considerably since they’d brushed Bruce’s minutes before. His own eyes were dilated now, just like Bruce’s were supposed to be. 

“Do you...” Crane started, then trailed off. “W-W-W—”

He flushed and flinched backwards, swallowing whatever he’d been thinking of saying. A question? Another order? Whatever Scarecrow had expected Batman to be like under his new toxin, this clearly was not it. He didn’t seem unconvinced by the act, however; the anxiety radiating from Crane in waves was entirely different than fear of a known enemy. It was more like...

Well. That would be convincing, wouldn't it?

Jonathan’s breath caught in his throat as Bruce pulled him down for a kiss. He remained breathless as Bruce ran his ungloved fingers through Jonathan’s hair, holding him in place with a hand tightly gripping the unwashed strands. Bruce drew back momentarily, concerned by the lack of air.

“Do you want me to stop?” Bruce asked, giving him a moment to catch his breath.

Jonathan shook his head, inhaling deeply. He didn’t move forward, however. Just stared at Bruce like he was waiting for some other shoe to drop.

Bruce could take a hint. He closed the distance between the two of them, this time pressing his lips only to the outside of Jonathan’s — lightly kissing the scars defacing the pale skin. 

The sound Jonathan made in response was somewhere between a whimper and a wheeze. Not particularly attractive, but certainly encouraging. Bruce tugged gently on Jonathan’s bottom lip, cautious not to set a precedent for biting _hard_ with a sadomasochistic sociopath.

It was a good call, as the careful pull of Bruce’s teeth seemed to jerk Jonathan from his unresponsive reverie. He immediately transitioned from motionless reception to attempting to mimic Bruce’s actions, tugging clumsily on Bruce’s upper lip. 

Bruce pulled away, uncomfortable, but redirected quickly by pressing a series of kisses to Jonathan’s neck. The strangled sound that Bruce could feel through Jonathan’s throat told him the other man hadn’t taken offense. 

A brief push against his shoulder made him back away, wondering if Jonathan was done. Instead, he grabbed Bruce’s arm. Bruce allowed him to raise his hand, watching curiously as Jonathan kissed a point on the inside of his wrist. His eyes flickered to Bruce’s as he did so, and in a flash Bruce realized what he was doing.

There was a scar where Jonathan had pressed his lips; a gash from a particularly bad fight with Joker, long healed over. Bruce hadn’t had it surgically smoothed away, like he had so many others, assured by Alfred that this one would fade over time. And it had, to the point that Bruce had forgotten about it entirely. Evidently it had still been noticeable to Jonathan when he’d been adjusting the seam above it. 

Something unexpectedly and disturbingly warm emerged in Bruce’s chest. Jonathan stared at him, waiting for... something. Acknowledgement? Approval? His expression was contented, hopeful in a way Bruce had never seen him. The effect, Bruce realized, was almost handsome.

“Doctor Crane?” came a yell from the other side of the office door. “We’re back. Pyg’s getting impatient. Kitty pulled him away from...”

Harley paused, evidently trying to find the words to describe what Pyg had been doing. 

“...something important,” she finished, pounding on the door for good measure. “Doc?”

“Give me a moment, child,” Crane said, stumbling backwards as he turned to shout at the door. “Just... finishing a few tests.”

Harley sighed, loudly. “Kay!” she yelled. Footsteps echoed away from the doorway, and Bruce could hear Harley yelling Scarecrow’s excuse to the others in the distance.

There was silence in the office for a moment, as Crane visibly attempted to process what had just happened. Bruce was doing a lot of processing himself, though he kept his face as blank as possible. His lack of expression didn’t seem to help Scarecrow, who took one look at Bruce’s impartial features and dropped down to where his mask had fallen on the floor. 

He pulled the scarecrow mask back over his head, hiding his face from view. “Finish getting dressed,” he said, voice clipped. He grabbed his scythe from where it leaned against the wall, his fists clenching around its wooden grip. 

Bruce obeyed, moving over to the desk. He pulled on the gloves. They were black leather, a detail that seemed almost comical now. The boots were made of the same material, and added back some of the height that Bruce had become very aware of in its absence. 

Scarecrow didn’t ask Bruce if he was done, just glanced over at the completed outfit and threw open the door to the rest of the asylum. Bruce silently followed him through the halls, watching as the freed inmates ducked out of the way of their clearly agitated liberator. 

Eventually, Scarecrow had led Bruce into Arkham’s main foyer, where Crane’s assistants were waiting for him alongside his blissed out captives. Kate, Barbara and Selina were as serene as ever, but the three villains looked uncomfortable with their presence. 

“Crane,” Freeze said. The greeting was particularly cold, even for him. “I was attempting to perfect a new technique by freezing specific synapses within the hippocampus and occipital cortex.”

“And?” Crane asked. The _am I supposed to be impressed_ went unspoken, but was heard clearly by everyone regardless.

“It is _delicate_ work,” Freeze hissed. “The surprise of being interrupted by a Bat — especially a Bat wearing _your_ disturbing trademark — had an unfortunately and entirely unnecessary effect on my patient’s treatment.”

Bruce’s heart sank. He hoped, for Barbara’s sake, that Crane’s victims wouldn’t remember their time spent under his newest toxin. If she knew that she had caused irreparable harm to someone, however inadvertently, it would haunt her for ages.

Pyg hummed unhappily, curling in on himself. “Bad, bad, bad. Not good enough yet!” he insisted. “Must get back to his dollies. They will be frightened without their Pyg.”

Everyone looked disturbed at that. Bruce wondered what Pyg was even doing here. Had Crane just invited anyone with a doctorate to join his plan? No wonder Ivy was so annoyed with him.

“...You will have considerably more opportunities for experimentation in the future, Freeze,” Crane said. “If the final phase of our plan is successfully completed tonight.”

“The night is well under way,” Freeze observed. “If we wished to move while the city sleeps, it would have been more prudent to start an hour ago.”

“He did start an hour ago,” Harley said, giggling. “It’s just that the _first_ phase of his final phase is a Batman dress up montage.”

Scarecrow crossed his arms. The motion was only slightly encumbered by the fact that he was still holding a scythe. 

“Ugly bats,” Pyg sang, waving his cleaver from Bruce to Barbara to Kate to Selina. “Impurrfect cat. Scarecrow stitched you all wrong! Pyg has so much more to give — a beauty from a bat!”

He took Kate’s red-gloved hand, giving it a slobbering kiss. She accepted the gesture serenely, then raised Pyg’s own hand to her lips, kissing it in return. He squealed happily, though the sound turned into a whimper of fear when Harley raised her sledgehammer in his direction.

“Ew,” she said succinctly. She stepped forward until Pyg stumbled backwards, waving his machete in a misguided message of surrender. “She doesn’t even like men. And if she _did_ like men, she definitely wouldn’t like _you._ ”

Crane cleared his throat. His fingers were clenched so tightly around the handle of his scythe that his knuckles had turned white. “You’ll take the new recruits with you. They double our numbers. We’ll be done in half the time.”

“Them?” Freeze echoed, glancing suspiciously towards the vigilantes. “Are they to be trusted?”

That seemed to improve Scarecrow’s mood. “Is that a note of fear I detect in your voice, Doctor?” 

“Healthy concern,” Freeze said flatly.

“Well, no worries,” Crane said. “They serve me and my cause. Absolutely, completely, and unquestioningly.”

Harley tilted her head. “Even Bats?” she asked. She smiled as she looked at Bruce, but her eyes shone with the same cutting intuition that made her a deceptively lethal opponent. “Red was able to snap him out easy-peasy before. Did he put up much of a fight?”

“Of course he put up a fight,” Scarecrow snapped. “Batman _always_ puts up a fight. Nonetheless, I was able to find a bit of...” 

He trailed off, glancing towards Selina. She was swaying in place, watching the proceedings with pleased bemusement.

“...leverage,” he finished.

Harley hummed in assent. Bruce guessed that she wasn’t completely convinced by Crane’s argument, but didn’t feel compelled to question him. She might not even care. Knowing Harley, she was probably ready to double cross her companions and run off with Ivy at the first sign of Bat-trouble.

Freeze, however, clearly had no such Plan B. “And you're _sure_ he's under your toxin's influence?” he pressed, staring pointedly in Batman’s direction. 

Scarecrow followed his gaze, turning to face Bruce for the first time since they exited Jeremiah’s office. At this distance, he couldn’t make out Crane’s expression through the shadows of his mask. But whatever contentment had briefly graced his features was clearly gone. 

“As sure as I could be,” he said, slowly. “But... have Batman accompany you. Have him participate in tonight’s experimentation. And if you have the slightest bit of doubt that he’s not completely under my control..”

He turned away from Bruce, gesturing for the group to follow him towards the double doors of Arkham. 

“Kill him.”

**Author's Note:**

> I don't actually like Scarecrow's New 52 origin very much, but I was trying to keep this as in-line with the comic's canon as possible. His stuttering, abusive scientist father, and decision to sew his own mouth shut are all from his origin story as establilshed in Batman: The Dark Knight.
> 
> I DID make some changes to the opening and ending from the comic, mainly in terms of Ivy and Harley's characterization, which I am always very opinionated about. I also just straight up removed any characters I'd never heard of, so apologies to anyone who's favorite Batman villain is... *checks notes* ..."Merry-Maker."


End file.
